Southern California football coach Pete Carroll talks to the media after they heard the BSC rankings announced at the Galen Center on the USC campus in Los Angeles on Sunday, Dec. 7, 2003. Southern Cal was ranked third, which means they will play in the Rose Bowl instead of the Sugar Bowl. (AP Photo/Jill Connelly) Coach Pete Carroll discusses his team's fate after top-ranked USC didn't qualify for the national title game.

The Bowl Championship Series, created in 1998 to provide a credible national championship game for college football, has managed to do the unthinkable: It has left the team ranked No. 1 in both polls out of the national title game and, by doing so, has created two national championship games.

It's almost unfathomable that the complicated BCS system, which involves subjective polls, computer rankings and assorted formulas, could have created such a result, with nearly everyone claiming it a travesty that USC, No. 1 in both the Associated Press media poll and the ESPN/USA Today coaches poll, will not be playing in the Sugar Bowl in the BCS national championship game on Jan. 4.

"We'd be foolish if we didn't take a hard look at (the BCS ranking formula) again in the spring," BCS coordinator Mike Tranghese said.

Instead, the Sugar Bowl will match LSU, ranked No. 2 in both polls as well as in the BCS standings, against Oklahoma, which dropped to No. 3 in both polls as a result of its stunning 35-7 loss to Kansas State in the Big 12 championship game but retained the No. 1 spot in the BCS.

USC will take its No. 1 ranking in the polls to the Rose Bowl on Jan. 1 for a game against No. 4 Michigan, re-establishing the Pac-10/Big Ten matchup the Rose Bowl savors. Although the ESPN/USA Today poll is obligated to name the Sugar Bowl winner its national champion, the AP poll is not, and USC could be voted No. 1 when the bowls are completed.

"As we look at it," USC coach Pete Carroll said, "we're the No. 1 team in the country, and if we win in the Rose Bowl, we'll be No. 1 and national champion."

One trickle-down effect on the other BCS games was that No. 5 Texas was eliminated from contention from a BCS game. Kansas State and Oklahoma earned BCS berths, and because no conference can have more than two teams in the BCS, the Longhorns were relegated to the Holiday Bowl against Washington State. With its automatic berth, Kansas State landed in the Fiesta Bowl against Ohio State, and Miami and Florida State will meet in the Orange Bowl in a rematch of the Hurricanes' 22-14 victory on Oct. 11. Miami and Florida State will play each other again in their 2004 season openers as members of the expanded ACC.

The focus will be on the Rose and Sugar bowls, however. The credibility of the BCS system long has been debated, but now the relevancy of the BCS is an issue if a team can win a share of the national title without playing in the BCS's version of the title game.

It's the second time in three years the BCS system has spit out a questionable matchup for the national championship. Following the 2001 regular season, Oregon, ranked No. 2 in both polls but fourth in the BCS standings, was bypassed for a berth in the national championship game in favor of Nebraska, which was fourth in the polls but second in the BCS despite losing its final regular-season game to Colorado 62-36 and not making it to the Big 12 title game.

Oregon rolled over No. 3 Colorado 38-16 in the Fiesta Bowl, then had to watch helplessly two nights later as Miami trounced Nebraska 37-14 in the BCS national championship game.

Detractors of the current system wonder how a team that has not won its conference championship can play for the national title, as happened in 2001 and again this season. Tranghese said BCS officials considered tinkering with the formula after the 2001 season because of that complaint, but ended up keeping the status quo. The pressure to make changes will be greater now.

"I don't think anyone will know who the legitimate national champion is unless all the three teams that seem to be in consideration have the opportunity to play one another," LSU coach Nick Saban said.

A playoff is not coming any time soon. The BCS agreement with ABC runs through the bowl games of January 2006, which means no format changes can be made until then. College presidents, who would have to vote to change the postseason system in Division I-A, have shown no inclination to have a playoff.

Even though his team got swamped in its last game, Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops says he has "nothing to apologize about" for being in the Sugar Bowl.

"In the end," he said, "we are No. 1 in the BCS, not 2 or 3, and I think that says enough."

In both 2001 and this season, the beneficiary of the BCS system was a Big 12 team. In both cases, the victim was a Pac-10 team. (Colorado of the Big 12 also thought it was unfairly overlooked in 2001.) And in both cases, it was a loss to a Bay Area team that doomed the Pac-10's chances of landing a team in the BCS title game. Stanford handed Oregon its only loss in 2001, and Cal was the only team to beat USC this season.

The Pac-10 is the only one of the six major conferences not to have a team in any of the five previous BCS title games. Each of the other conferences has claimed one national title.

The polls, computer rankings, strength of schedule, losses and quality wins are the components taken into consideration in the BCS formula, with the lowest score being the most desired. Apparently, the deciding factor this year, as it was in 2001, was the strength of schedule, which also affects the computer rankings. In the end, LSU finished with 5.99 points, a minuscule 0.16 of a point advantage over third-place USC. Notre Dame's loss to Syracuse on Saturday or Hawaii's loss to Boise State Saturday night in the very last game of the Division I-A regular season might have made the difference.

"Coaches have always said football is a game of inches," Sugar Bowl Director Paul Hoolihan said. "Unfortunately, with the BCS now, it has become a game of fractions."

Pac-10 Commissioner Tom Hansen said he would try to affect changes in the current system when BCS officials meet in April.

"I would suggest eliminating the computers altogether," Hansen said. "They have hurt the Pac-10, and that's one thing, but they are just illogical rankings. The Sagarin rankings, for example, had Miami of Ohio No. 3 and USC fourth. That's absurd."

Saban pointed out that both LSU and Oklahoma had to face a highly ranked team in a 13th game, in a conference championship game, something USC did not have to do in the Pac-10. "So we had to do a little more to earn the right," he said.

If there is any benefit to the debate, it is that college football will receive more attention than it might have if there were no argument. After the controversy two years ago, National Public Radio devoted a show to the BCS.